"I never tell my hands what to do. I "hook up,"and I go. My job is to impart to my
patient what it is like to be right in the sense of a functionally integrated body-mind.
This is transmitted, I feel, through the nervous system from the therapist's mind,
through his hands, to the involved area. This feeling is picked up in the patient's
mind because of the manner in which the tissues are worked, creating the feeling of
relaxation."

So says Dr. Milton Trager, M.D., the force behind The Trager Approach, which he
first encountered intuitively, almost accidentally, at the age of 18. He then spent the
next 50 years, first as a lay practitioner and later as a medical professional, expanding
and refining his discovery.

In the coming decade, massage, bodywork and therapeutic touch will be a major
contributing force to a healthier way of life. The Trager Approach is one such form of
bodywork, bringing more awareness into the body through the use of touch,
movement and verbal suggestions. Trager is a simple approach which can minimize
stress-induced tension, and replace aches and pain with pleasurable sensations.

A Trager session takes from one to one-and-a-half hours. No oils or lotions are used.
The client wears swim trunks or briefs and lies on a well-padded table in a warm,
comfortable environment. During the session, the practitioner contacts the body of
the client in a gentle, rhythmic and non-intrusive way.

The practitioner works in a relaxed meditative state of consciousness which Dr.
Trager calls "hook-up." This state allows the practitioner to connect deeply with the
recipient in an unforced way, to remain continually aware of the slightest responses,
and to work efficiently without fatigue.

"No pain, no gain" is NOT a formula used with Trager.

No one can give what they do not genuinely have. This is why the cultivation by the
practitioner of the mental state Dr. Trager calls "hook-up" -- a relaxed, meditative
alertness -- is crucial to effective Trager work. The state of "hook-up" is not
fundamentally different from a state of deep meditation, even though the
practitioner in "hook-up" is physically active.

"It is," Dr. Trager says, "like floating in a vast ocean of pleasantness," and it is the
gentle rocking of that ocean which is imparted to the client's body.

The principle is elegantly simple: We learn to love by being loved, we learn
gentleness by being gentled, we learn to be graceful by experiencing the feeling of
grace. The goal of a Trager session is no more complex than this -- to bring to the
surface of consciousness this awareness, and of the pleasurable and positive feelings
that are inherent in it. Trager was developed as a sensory means of redirecting the
footsteps of someone who has lost the way.

Since birth, we have in our day-to-day life-style brought to the mind many good and
bad experiences that have shaped us physically and psychologically. Every individual
carries within themselves an exceedingly intricate computer system, a recorder that
has no erase button. Whatever experiences have been put there will always be there,
influencing every function of the mind and body. Since it is not possible to avoid a
variety of traumas, and since none may be erased once they have occurred, help
should be directed towards bringing appropriate positive feeling experiences to the
client. These help directly to influence the mind and body, so that the physical
patterns can be alleviated.

Dr. Trager contends he is not a "healer" or a manipulator of esoteric energies. At this
time no one can say with certainty just exactly how these sensations, feelings, and
actions are materially interrelated, but the fact that they profoundly influence one
another is abundantly clear. Out of over 5,000 painful lower backs that he has treated
in over 55 years as a therapist, he asserts that 90% have had notable and lasting relief
from a single session.

The Trager Approach is not in itself a medical treatment, but a learning experience.
You are learning how your body can move. You are learning what it is like to be freer
and lighter. It is a learning approach to using yourself well, to being a whole person,
to having all your pieces and parts well integrated and coordinated, to feeling
yourself connected to the energies which sustain you.

After getting up from the table, the client receives movement instructions to
maintain and even enhance the sense of lightness, freedom, and flexibility that were
instilled by the table work. The lessons help the client recall the pleasurable sensory
state which produced tissue change, and because it is this feeling state which
triggered positive tissue response in the first place, every time the feeling is recalled
the changes deepen, become more permanent, and more receptive to further
positive change.